You can vary the flavour of this dish by using different Asian bean pastes or chilli bean pastes, such as Japanese miso, Chinese doubanjiang ... I like to flavour the pork with a lot of ginger.
Mapo tofu is one of the most well-known dishes from Sichuan in southwest China, made of tofu, minced pork, and spices ... Fermented bean paste, or doubanjiang, adds umami to the dish.